This learn node illustration is from John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s course on Public Health Biology: page 26 of Lecture 5 (PDF). The Johns Hopkins course is an excellent source for learning about how diseases infect us, how they make us sick. and how they can become resistant to drugs. A particularly lethal bacteria is very much in the news for its drug resistance: Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). An excellent primer on MRSA can be found at the online Mayo Clinic.
We all want to know how to keep the bacteria from finding us and making us sick – or even killing us. Today the New York Times published answers to many of our questions about how to stay well as this superbug bacteria gets more resistant and more wide-spread.
As you have probably been hearing and reading, washing our hands is a key way to keep safe from the superbugs. Below are links to webpages reviewing how and why do to that. One of the things I learned from finding them is to use the towel I dry with to turn off the faucet: it protects from reinfecting my hands (makes sense).
How To Wash Your Hands (video)
The National Food Service Management Institute
Center for Disease Control and Prevention
Caught Dirty-Handed MicroWorld games
More learn nodes at: learnodes.com